Being a mostly visual diary of the creation of high quality, historically accurate 25mm/28mm scale terrain

for a refight of the battle waged by the British and Afghans on July 27th, 1880,

in time for its recent 130th anniversary on Tuesday, July 27th, 2010.

Above is a pic of Lt. Colonel James Galbraith, Regimental Colour in hand, alongside Bobbie the regimental dog and some of the other "Last Eleven" survivors of the 66th (Berkshire) Regiment, making their last stand in one of the walled gardens just South of Khig village, a few miles West of the Afghan town of Maiwand.

Sunday, August 12, 2012

Another rocky hill...

About to head off on a family vacation and wanted to put this up before leaving. Just finished this latest rocky wood-chip hill this past week, and think it turned out well. Nothing new compared to the prior info I've posted on building and painting these, but still feel it's worth posting. Right now I'm just posting painting pics, the construction pics will have to wait, there are too many of them, and not enough time right now. Still, some good stuff here I believe...

Here's a pic of the finished product, just before receiving its first coat of paint...

It's made of 1/8" Masonite baseboard, 1" white insulation foam for the base contour, glued down using rubber cement, wood-chips and more styrofoam all joined together with a trusty hot glue-gun, then Elmer's Wood Filler used to seal exposed foam surfaces and add texture, then mixed ballast and pebbles glued onto some of the surface areas, to blend in better with the ground cover on my terrain boards, and everything -- except the wood-chips -- gets a coating of Woodland Scenics "Scenic Cement" applied with an eye-dropper, to help bond it all together...

Spraypaint base coat of BLACK...

Heavy dry-brush -- just shy of a second base coat -- of DARK BROWN...

Medium dry-brush coat of HONEYCOMB (Delta Ceramcoat shade of caramel) ONLY ON THE BASE CONTOUR AND TOP OF THE HILL (not on the ROCKS!)...

Lighter dry-brush of Delta Ceramcoat SANDSTONE (the Dark Brown, Honeycomb, and Sandstone trio are the same colors used on my terrain boards, so now this hill should blend in pretty well with my ground cover)...

The trickiest part: mixing some HONEYCOMB (the caramel colour) with a little BLACK to create the deep, drab "olive-brown" shade I use on the rocky crags...

An old Wargames Foundry Darkest Africa British Officer -- sculpted by the oh-so-talented Mark Copplestone -- crowns the heights for purposes of observation...

Fortified by The Guides...

Close-up of a piece of rocky hillside...

Gotta' save the "construction" pics for another day, but one thing I'll add is that these hills -- despite looking somewhat heavy -- are actually quite light, while also being very sturdy and able to withstand a decent amount of use/player abuse, while retaining their appearance.

MALALAI -- Afghan folk-heroine of Maiwand (click on pic for more info)

BOBBIE -- pet of Sergeant P. Kelly of the 66th (Berkshire) Regt. (click on pic for more info)

Bobbie was separated from his master during the battle and is said to have been present during the final stand of "The Last Eleven" beyond the walled gardens of the village of Khig. Somehow he made it all the way to Kandahar on his own, where he was reunited with his owner. Bobbie returned to England with the regiment and was personally decorated for his service by Queen Victoria. Sadly, the following year he was hit by a hansom cab and killed. Figure is from MIRLITON Medieval accessory range.